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tried a resocket, total failure

Hi everyone,
After receiving some new reprogrammed chips from omikron, I went ahead and removed the old prom and replaced it with a socket, plugged in the power, and the fan started to whirl...however when i plugged it into a tv, I got nothing. no picture whatsoever. i could have sworn i got all the pins connected properly, but i think i forgot to take the watch battery out...anyone got any ideas on how to get this working? or even better, does anyone live in Los Angeles CA or the surrounding area that could help me out (I will pay you, of course)...thanks for your help everyone...

tried it with component out and not hdmi...shouldnt it work out of any of the 3 tho (in theory)...will also try a new battery but it seems like the battery was working great before...is there a real chance I could have fried something? (i read alphawolfs post about his attempt and success and I couldn't seem to repeat it myself)...

Anything is possible. I've never soldered on a motherboard with the battery in place so I'm not sure what the symptoms may be. Could be that a connection somewhere else on the motherboard was fractured during removal/installation. That's usually what I expect to see when results are intermittent. ( That or a bad cable or connection on the TV ).

Does the fan continue to run when the TV is attached?

Do you hear the hard disk spin up? If not, then something may very well be up with your connections/PROM.

You might also want to thoroughly check the power supply board for any signs of scorching or raised/puffy capacitors.

well the fan does not power on any more but the hard drive spins and the nic lights flash...still no picture...and neither the original prom nor the mod omikron sent me get any different reaction...and i don't see any signs of damaged caps (or other components)...i saw a diagram for testing pins in one of alphawolf's posts, but it doesn't quite make sense (if the pins should have a connection, what to test to what, ect)...i used to resoldier chips for my buddies race car computer calibration, i guess i am losing my touch :/

Could be that a connection is weak or has been broken due to pulling PROM chips in and out. The easy way to correct that is to quickly retouch each connection with a hot soldering iron. (Re-fluxing and re-cleaning would probably be a good idea).

Could also be the case that somewhere a connection was fused with it's neighbor. I use an ohm meter with audible alert to check each connection on the socket to it's neighbor. If two pins are connected, break out the solder wick, clean it up, and try again.

Lastly, (worst case) could be a pad got lifted during PROM removal and repeated pulling has caused a break. Those problems aren't insurmountable but a pain in the arse to deal with. The best way to help isolate that is to and test each connection to it's destination. Having a relevant connection diagram will help with that. I posted one in this thread for the TivoHD but have other ones tucked away somewhere.

Ok that helps a lot...Luckily I did a good enough soldier job that none of my pads were lifted...but yeah it just says in the instructions to check the pins with an ohm meter, now I understand exactly why (to make sure the pins aren't soldered to their neighbor)...I'll check my solder joint again and use the ohm tester to see if there are neighbor shorts, should I check for any other shorts? If I keep having troubl I'll post some pics up here for public scrutiny...

Also is it safe to say that the fact that my hdd and network lights fire up is a good sign all hope is not lost yet?

Thanks a lot for your help guys and gals...once I can do this once successfully I will probably do a video how to that answers questions I'm having now (once I answer them myself)

I think if I recall correctly, when mine wasn't working correctly I'd plug it in and get nothing at all, I may have gotten the hard disk spinning up but I'm not sure. I don't think I had an ethernet cable connected so I don't think those would light up. It just turned out though that this one pin was loose and I hadn't noticed it. When I went probing around the pins I happened to notice that it shook, so I just soldered that one down and it worked.

I was very careful to make sure that no pins anywhere were bridged before ever turning it on. I did this by putting the new prom in the socket, and testing each pin one by one with an audible continuity check. I'd go ahead and check continuity with all of those pins to the nearby resistor array as diagrammed though. Make sure everything works as it should. If just one of those isn't properly connected then that could be your problem.

Also did you cover your entire motherboard with aluminum foil when you did this? If not I'd check to see if you have any solder splash anywhere as that could screw something up.

Last edited by AlphaWolf; 01-12-2010 at 03:17 AM.

Before PMing me: Iím not your personal tech support. If you have a question, ask in public so I don't have to repeat if somebody else asks. If you want images or slices, use emule. I will ignore all support PMs.

Dry joint S2DT prom

Thanks for the tip AlphaWolf! I'd already touched up the joints thrice, but when checking for shorts (again) I gave the pins a sidesways push and waddayaknow one of the corner ones moved. Soldered it properly and it works. Phew!
Now for the software...